Many think that hospice care means someone is in their last days of life and everyone speaks in whispers while others tip toe around. Then when it’s over, everyone packs up and disappears and sends a bill a week later.
If that’s your version on hospice, you’ll be glad to know that overview of the situation is wrong on so many levels.
If you, or your loved one, needs hospice service, and if you live in the Ashland or Hayward area, or in Burnett County or Spooner area, experts from the Regional Hospice Services would be the ones you’d call or go through your medical facility to arrange for care.
And they wouldn’t necessarily wait until the last moment to come; they’ve had clients use their service for months.
Jill Schlapper is one of the hospice team members and she’s from Shell Lake.
She wasn’t aware of hospice until 2002 when her dad got sick. She had graduated in 1975 and was a nurse’s aide and then married. She picked nursing because at that time, nursing and teaching were the most touted career choices for young women.
Executive Director, Lynda Anderson, started as a registered nurse and worked in the burn unit at St. Mary’s hospital for years and then five years in a cardiac care unit. The burn unit was home to her because of a serious burn she personally experienced and the excellent care she received. But in 1999 she got involved with hospice care and has been in intricate part of the team for the past 19 years.
Because hospice believes that everyone has the right to die pain-free and with dignity, their team consists of the patient’s personal physician and nurses who provide individualized care focused on pain and symptom management, medication teaching and management with physician consultation to assure comfort.
A chaplain offers spiritual and emotional support to patients and their loved ones and works with the patient’s community of faith along with trained volunteers who provide support to patients and families by running errands, preparing meals and light housekeeping and staying with a patient to give family members a break and lending emotional support and companionship.
There’s also a social worker who assists the patient and family with financial matters like the power of attorney and living will documents, emotional support and counseling services along with home health aides who attend to personal care and help with activities of daily living and socialization.
This non-profit organization covers a 50 mile radius from Spooner and a bit beyond. They work through five local care facilities and in a large part through word-of-mouth referrals, everyone supportive of their solid reputation. The service works through Medicare, Medicaid, the Veteran’s Association and private insurance. Hospice provides service based on the need, regardless of one’s ability to pay, so no one is ever denied.
This year, Regional Hospice Service is celebrating 25 years of caring for the end of life patient and their families.
The team doesn’t just stay until the funeral, to which they always send a single rose, they extend their aftercare for an additional 13 months with phone calls starting right after the funeral and then at 6 weeks, 3 months, 6 months, at the one year mark and then at month 13. They also send appropriate birthday and anniversary cards throughout the year so the care giver isn’t the only one who remembers the important dates.
These are not dreary people by any means; the house is often filled with laughter and smiles.
Their “Catch a Dream” program exists to do special things for terminally ill patients in order to add quality to their lives. “We want to do what we can to fulfill their wishes, sometimes it’s a sailing trip on Lake Superior or a candlelight dinner with their spouse or a special gathering with out-of-town family members or maybe rent a golf cart so they can be mobile in their own yard. We make it possible to hunt, fish, golf or whatever else the patient's special wish or dream may be if we can.”
And how can you help? Volunteers are needed to assist with patient care, companion services, office and clerical support and public education. This service has assisted over 350 patients and families, 95 of them in the Spooner area alone, and their main fund-raising is a Spring Fling Dinner on April 22 held this year at Tesora in Siren. At $35 per person, adults over 18 can expect dinner, entertainment, silent auctions and drawings when they join the 200 plus others there.
Ask any of the team and they will say it’s more like taking care of their neighbors because the service is so personalized. “They become like family and even though we can’t change the outcome, we can walk alongside them and make it easier.”
Now that we’ve taken the scary out of hospice, if you’d like to volunteer, call their Spooner location at 715-635-9077 to get more information.
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Diane Dryden has been a feature writer for twelve years and is the author of two novels. Order your copy of the Accidental King of Clark Street and Double or Nothing on Foster Avenue today!
[Photo by Diane Dryden]
Last Update: Jan 30, 2017 10:55 am CST
